


Drop Pop Candy

by CatKing_Catkin



Series: Cheer Up The Skeleton Week [5]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Birthday Fluff, Birthday Party, Brother Feels, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Bonding, Brotherly Love, Family Fluff, Gen, Good Brother Sans, M/M, Minor Mettaton/Papyrus, No More Resets (Undertale), Papyrus Being Papyrus, Post-Undertale Pacifist Route, Post-Undertale Pacifist Route - "I want to stay with you.", Sans Has Issues, Sans Needs A Hug, Sans Remembers Resets, Singing, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 21:21:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10317209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CatKing_Catkin/pseuds/CatKing_Catkin
Summary: Written for the "Cheer Up The Skeleton" week on tumblr, Day 5 - prompt "music".It's coming up on Papyrus' first birthday on the surface. Sans wants to do something special, but is at a loss as to what. Mettaton has an idea, but is at a loss as to how to convince Sans to go along with it. Fortunately, no matter their differences, the two of them are united by one common belief - Papyrus deserves the best.So when Mettaton digs up a piece of ancient family history, Sans actually stops and thinks about all he'd lost when the resets began. More importantly, he finally starts to consider all that he might be able to get back now that they're over.





	

Papyrus and Mettaton’s relationship was a surprisingly lowkey one.

Or perhaps it wasn’t so surprising. After all, the only times they were physically _together_ was whenever Mettaton had time to take a break between tours. Mettaton absolutely _loved_ being on tour, so the only times he ever took a break was when he needed to be fixed up, his band requested time off for themselves, or his band requested time off for the sake of himself – and even then, sometimes he’d carry on alone.

But that was fine for Papyrus and Mettaton, at least. They seemed happy to communicate by long distance. Papyrus sent dozens of text messages and emails every day and, though Mettaton clearly didn’t have the time to reply quite as often when he was on the road, he made sure to acknowledge when he could that each message of support was received, appreciated, and reciprocated. When the robot did have cause to come home, he generally spent his brief vacations in periods of low energy, periods where the normally glittering, boisterous, beaming rockstar was quite happy to lay on the couch bundled up in an oversized sweater watching movies, or else hanging off Papyrus’ arm while they did things together.

During these periods, he seemed almost to be drinking in Papyrus’ everpresent energy like a flower could drink in sunlight. Though he could never match that energy, not really, what Mettaton offered in return was even more important to Papyrus and always had been. He offered unabashed, unashamed love and appreciation, to a depth that no one besides Sans had ever matched.

So even if Mettaton might not ever be Sans’ favorite person to be around – sometimes opposites really didn’t attract – they had one important thing in common, and so that helped things work out okay.

Things almost stopped working out okay very, very quickly, however, a couple of weeks before Papyrus’ first birthday on the surface.

“You never told me you could sing,” Mettaton murmured, as he and Sans flopped together on the couch watching the last twenty minutes of the movie. Papyrus had gone to bed twenty minutes ago. He was a growing skeleton, after all, and growing skeletons needed their beauty rest. Sans had given up on the idea of ever growing any bigger, and knew that he was certainly unlikely to get any more beautiful. So he had decided that a full eight hours could remain a pipe dream. Mettaton, meanwhile, had been charging up this whole time. Sans considered the possible repercussions of unplugging him and bolting for his room, but Mettaton’s gaze was fixed on him and Sans didn’t think even he could move fast enough.

“i, uh, can’t,” he said instead. It wasn’t entirely a lie.

“That’s not what Papyrus said.”

“oh, yeah? when was that?”

“Well, you do know his birthday is coming up, don’t you?”

Now it was Sans’ turn to stare, unblinking, until Mettaton had the decency to look away and let the stupid question pass unanswered. Sans answered the obvious followup question instead.

“i just, y’know. don’t know what any of that has to do with me hypothetically singing.”

“He misses when the two of you used to sing together. Didn’t you know that?”

…oh. There was no snarking his way out of that one, though Sans took a second to try to think of one. But at last, he knew he was trapped.

“i didn’t know he remembered,” he finally admitted.

Mettaton snorted wryly. “Are you joking? I’ve never seen Papyrus forget _anything_.”

This, Sans knew, was not entirely true. But it was true enough for now. It was true enough up here.

Mettaton took advantage of the silence and took the chance to move in for the metaphorical kill. “Why did you stop?”

Sans knew the answer to that. He had stopped because the resets had started. He had stopped because days didn’t really matter when they didn’t end, no matter how much he loved the people within them. He had stopped because how could he sing with his brother while they did chores together when he knew his brother might die in just a few hours. What did _chores_ even matter under those circumstances, let alone songs? When he woke up from memories of bleeding out and dying, Sans barely had the energy to open his mouth and say “hello”, never mind carry a tune in a bucket.

Sans never really forgot anything either, though he’d often wished he could.

At least he was finally starting to believe those days were over and done with now.

“i dunno,” is what he said out loud, anxiously drumming his fingerbones on the arm of the couch and hoping that didn’t betray him. “guess i just kinda lost interest.” Like he’d lost interest in cleaning, moving, working, being awake…

He darted a glance out of the corner of one eyesocket, and saw from the way that Mettaton had raised an eyebrow that Sans’ nervous fidgeting had indeed given him away. The robot made a drawling “mhm” sort of sound.

“Well, if you could perhaps muster some interest for just a little while…I thought it might make a nice birthday present for him if you two made a comeback tour.”

Oh dear. Sans felt cold sweat start to prickle on his skull. “uh…how? where?” Mettaton looked like a robot with a plan.

“At the karaoke bar I’m taking you all to for the party, of…hey!”

Sans had just enough time to hear Mettaton cry out in indignant offense before he completed his hasty shortcut safely into his own bedroom behind his own bedroom door. Of course, as the world slid back into focus around him, the world with his familiar bed and familiar pile of unwashed socks, he also heard Mettaton knocking quite forcibly on his bedroom door.

_“Sans!”_

It was a stage whisper from someone who was used to being on stage. Sans winced but, knowing he would get no sleep just yet, risked a reply.

“you keep up like that, you’re gonna wake papyrus up and spoil the big surprise.”

“There won’t _be_ a big surprise if you don’t stop being ridiculous! I thought you’d leap at the chance to have me do your work for you in figuring out a gift! If Papyrus is to be believed, you’d barely have to practice! What in the world is the matter with you, Sans? Stage fright?”

Mettaton laughed as though the very idea was ridiculous, and Sans took a split second too long to come up with a better answer. Unfortunately, by the time Mettaton had stopped laughing, he was still frozen to the spot. And then Sans facepalmed to hear the robot gasp.

“You _do_ have stage fright? _You_? But…that Christmas party! You and Toriel and the pizza and…”

“hey.” Sans spoke up through gritted teeth. “shush. please. thanks.”

That had been the party where Undyne had talked him into trying to see if skeletons could get drunk, and where Sans had learned that skeletons apparently could get drunk, and so could goat momsters. Besides, it was _Toriel_. She was important, of course, but important in a different way from Papyrus. And besides, how could Mettaton compare something like the fine sport of pizza tossing to something as _important_ as Sans’ memories of just…being with Papyrus and singing with him and being _happy_?

Some of his turmoil and frustration must have shown in his voice. Mettaton was uncharacteristically silent for a long, long moment, though Sans knew better than to think he’d gotten away with this.

When Mettaton spoke again, the rock star sounded quiet and subdued. Sans was startled to feel a shred of guilt curling around his ribcage.

“It’s all right if you’re nervous, darling. I know exactly what that feels like.”

Sans had to press both hands against his mouth in an attempt not to laugh too obviously. “ _you_? seriously?”

“Yes, seriously! Even a glorious star such as myself is nervous before every single show!”

He didn’t _sound_ like he was joking. Mettaton wasn’t exactly a bastion of humor even under normal circumstances. Sans tilted his head, curious despite himself. “how do you mean?”

The robot actually sounded quite _passionate_ as he carried on. “Every time I go up on stage, I wonder if this will be the last time! The performance where my spark dries up! The show where the audience gets _bored!_ And don’t even get me started on how there are a _thousand_ pieces of me that could go wrong at any second, and they could go wrong for thousands of my adoring fans to see! Every time I step on stage, I know that…even I risk humiliating myself. Always wondering if this will be the day they realize I’m no good at all…”

Oh. Sans felt his soul ache in sympathy with the doubt that lay thick and plain in the other monster’s voice. He didn’t know what it was like to feel that way at all, of course, but he could tell that Mettaton truly did, that it truly weighed on him, and that it cost the star to bare his own soul to Sans like this.

He knew that Mettaton wouldn’t let himself be vulnerable like this unless he truly believed it was important. Even so, Sans wondered for a moment if Mettaton might have managed to talk himself out of this whole plan.

“so why do you do it?”

When Mettaton replied, Sans was reassured that the Rockstar hadn’t talked himself out of _anything_. The robot sounded downright rapturous, now, in awe of the life he had before him. “Because until that day comes, I make my fans happy. And the rush of stepping through those nerves and out on stage anyway…there’s nothing like it in the world. And…I make _me_ happy. Let’s not forget that.”

Neither of them needed to breathe, but Mettaton still paused in the place where a deep, steadying breath might otherwise be. A pause for dramatic effect, from the most dramatic robot. “And I think, if you gave singing another chance, you would make Papyrus very happy. Not only that, you might find some energy again. Most of all...I think it might make _you_ happy, Sans.”

“me?”

“Singing is one of the purest forms of _expression_ , darling. If you don’t mind my saying, for such a short fellow, you really do seem to have a lot bottled up inside.”

“but even if i did mind you saying, you’d still say it anyway?”

“Well…” He could hear the knowing smile in Mettaton’s voice. It even managed to be fractionally less annoying than it might have been half an hour ago. “Only because I think it needs saying. It’s not good to bottle up, Sans. I might find you impossibly irritating otherwise, but the fact remains that you’re important to Papyrus, and so you’re important to me. If I can help you settle in up here, in any way at all, I consider it a duty and a pleasure.”

Sans let out his breath in a long, tired, _resigned_ sigh. Yet while he was there, in at least the visual privacy of his own room, he also couldn’t quite seem to keep a smile off his skull. It wasn’t until he trudged to his bedroom door and opened it – pausing just long enough to retrieve something from his pocket – that he managed to compose his expression into something suitably put-upon and reluctant. Mettaton’s smile only widened when he saw Sans standing there and realized that he had won.

“if i hate this, you’ll drop the subject for the rest of literally forever?”

“Rockstar’s honor.” Mettaton offered a jaunty salute, and then held out his hand for Sans to shake. Sans shook. There was a faint _buzz_ , and Mettaton promptly pulled his hand back with a muffled yelp. Sans stood there, grinning unashamedly now, as the robot shook out his hand and glowered back at him.

“You’re _so_ lucky Papyrus likes you, darling.”

“yeah,” Sans agreed with an easy nod. “i really am. okay, mettaton. you’ve got two weeks – sell me on this.”

*  *  *

It was a long two weeks and a very hard sell, since some of Mettaton’s ideas for curing stage fright would probably have given Sans a heart attack had he had an actual heart. It was an _exhausting_ two weeks, too, requiring more energy and activity from Sans than he’d ever been called upon to display when the fate of everything wasn’t at stake. But he also knew that was part of the point. Mettaton was trying to get him used to being alive and active again, because _Papyrus_ had been trying to get him used to being alive and active again ever since their first few days on the surface.

Sans knew that his brother’s efforts had been more successful, would always be more successful. He indulged Mettaton’s as well, however, because he could tell that they showed that the robot cared in his own way, and because they weren’t exactly unhelpful, either.

No matter how trying and tiresome it was to learn to walk in six inch heels or sky dive or stand on his head while reciting the alphabet backwards, or do any number of the other bizarre and twisted “confidence exercises” Mettaton came up with were, they did ultimately serve a purpose. By the end of those two weeks, the thought of just getting up on a stage and singing with his brother seemed positively _mundane_ , and maybe even fun. Then again, with Papyrus, anything was fun.

The test of that belief came on the day of Papyrus’ birthday party. The karaoke bar was their third stop in the celebration extravaganza that had eventually picked up Undyne, Alphys, Toriel, Asgore, Frisk, Napstablook, Shyren, Lemon Bread, Burger Pants, Monster Kid, Dogamy, Dogarressa, Doggo, Greater Dog, Lesser Dog, Endogeny, Grillby, and Heat Flamesman. Everyone had eaten a great deal and drunk plenty of whatever they wanted and were legally allowed to drink. They’d rented out the stage for the rest of the night. And, unbeknownst to all but two of the partygoers, Sans was up first.

Mettaton had picked out a wide variety of possible songs for the brothers to sing. Sans, just this once, had put forth the effort of overruling him.

_“you think they’ll have this song on hand?”_

_Mettaton looked at the lyrics Sans had printed out. He raised his eyebrows as recognition apparently dawned, and let out a low whistle of surprise. “My word! I remember this show.”_

_“thought you might, knowing alphys like you do.”_

_“It’s_ old _, though. So old that even Alphys was never able to find the second DVD.”_

 _“yeah, because_ we _had it. we watched that thing to pieces, when we were babybones.” Sans smiled distantly at the memory. “we knew the lyrics to the beginning and the ending song by heart. dang, but we were the biggest nerds.”_

_Mettaton smiled fondly and passed the paper back to Sans. “It seems to me that you still are, darling. But that’s part of your charm, if you ask me.”_

The fact that the bar actually had a track listing of old anime songs, and had the one Sans wanted in the roster, was a patented Birthday Miracle if anything was. Then again, Papyrus deserved nothing less.

Sans would prove it, if he just got up the nerve to climb up onto this stage.

Slipping away from their cluster of tables had been easy. He had a lot of friends now, far more than he ever would have dreamed possible once before, but Sans was still eminently less noticeable than Papyrus was and he was okay with this.

Sans was also still nervous about climbing up on that stage and baring his soul to all these people, even all these people he actually liked, and he was much less okay with it.

In the end, he just closed his eyes and reminded himself that once this was over with, at least he wouldn’t have to listen to Mettaton’s coaching ever ever ever agan. He reminded himself that there was no reason why this wouldn’t be fun. After all, this time, Papyrus would be singing beside him again.

Sans climbed up to the stage and took up the microphone.

*  *  *

The music started. The chatter dimmed, though it didn’t entirely die away. The lights dimmed, but for a spotlight that appeared on stage. That spotlight contained a single, short skeleton, clutching a microphone tight in two tense hands.

Papyrus looked up sharply. His eyesockets went wide. His eyelights seemed to glow. And he _gasped_ in recognition and recollection.

_"umbrella at your side, it's raining but you close it tight..."_

Mettaton held out a second microphone, and Papyrus snatched it up and had it to his mouth in time to sing: _"'AND HOW ARE YOU?' PURRED A CAT JUST PASSING THROUGH!"_ He was genuinely vibrating now with excitement. Everyone at the table could _hear_ his bones rattling.

Sans' smile was almost genuinely heartwrenching in how nervous it was, but he _did_ smile as his brother dashed towards the stairs, all but skidding to a stop on stage beside him. _"those heels that you like are soaking, but is that all right?"_

*  *  *

Papyrus could not sing. Well, Papyrus _technically_ could not sing. In fact, it was almost impressive, how many of the accepted rules of how to sing he broke in ways that not even Mettaton had known could be done.

Still, Papyrus could still do what Sans had struggled with to get this far, was visibly struggling with even now. Papyrus didn't hesitate to leap into perhaps the most important aspect of singing, in baring his emotions and his soul wholeheartedly and without reservation. That, in Mettaton's very definite opinion, made up the difference and then some.

They even made an interesting visual contrast to watch, up on stage. Sans stood stock-still in the center as only a skeleton could stand still. Both his hands gripped the microphone tightly, and he could only actually look out at the audience for a glance and an instant at a time. Otherwise, he kept his eyes on his feet, or - with increasing regularity - up at his overjoyed brother. Papyrus, meanwhile, obviously couldn't have stood still if his life depended on it. He held the microphone in one hand, having to keep correcting himself so that he held it to his mouth at all. He twirled from one side of the stage to the other, his other arm thrown out wide as though to welcome them all.

But always, always, he would inevitably return to Sans' side before the music took him away again. And even if he couldn't sing on an ordinary technical level, Sans still looked up at his brother like here was a skeleton that had hung the stars themselves.

Mettaton knew the feeling.

_"but look around..."_

_"DANCE UP AND DOWN!"_

_"the world is now..."_

_"STILL GOING ROUND!"_

Mettaton understood, now, why this was a song they'd held on to and remembered through so many seemingly hopeless years. This wasn't just a song that represented a distant, happy childhood. This was a song that represented _them_ , as they had always been and wished to always be. And as the song unrolled onwards, they increasingly looked only to one another, and in the brighter lights of their eyesockets Mettaton plainly saw the words that they never said to one another out loud.

_I love you and I need you and the world is a good place with you in it and there's no one else I'd rather see it with._

Of course, it was so terribly gauche to state the obvious. What mattered was that the love and devotion between these two brothers came through just as loud and clear to the rest of the audience as well. Sans and Papyrus got applauded into three encores, and they were  both still smiling when they finally sat back down.

“happy birthday, papyrus,” Sans said, beaming up at his brother.

Papyrus swept him up into a rib-creaking hug. “THANK YOU, SANS. YOU MADE IT ABSOLUTELY PERFECT.”


End file.
